Confusion
"normal speech"
'thought speech'
(author's note)
"Those who do not understand true pain can never understand true peace."
― Nagato Uzumaki
Location: Unknown Forest
When Pain opened his eyes, he felt a headache and all he could see was trees. He wished he knew how did he end up in a forest since he had just destroyed Konoha, this wasn't supposed to be the location he should be in.
"Aaahh... my head... it hurts..." by tapping his hand on his forehead, Pain could only ask one question: "Who am I? I'm Yahiko... No, I'm Nagato...". Pain started to feel another headache, which made him hold his head. "No... I'm neither Yahiko nor Nagato... I'm my own person. I'm Pain and no one else". Pain said to himself, already reassured.
'What is the meaning of this...? It should be impossible for me to be in this place. I'm sure that I was in the middle of Konoha, it was just dust everywhere but I know there should be just a crater where I would land... not a forest...' Pain thought, confused by the situation he was in.
When Pain got out of his thoughts, he took a better look around and noticed that all the other paths were in the same location, but all unconscious. The asura path was still destroyed after the Akimichi attack.
"All the paths are here? so I'm still near Konoha? but where is Konan? she was supposed to be watching over these bodies while I performed the Shinra Tensei... well whatever, all I need to do is go back and capture the nine tails, that is my next objective". Pain stated.
Then all the pains started to get up according to his command.
'So, they still obey me... Good. I should take care of asura's body before returning to battle... 'He thought commanding Naraka to restore asura using the king of hell.
After chewing a bit, asura comes out from the king of hell's mouth, good as new.
"Excellent, now I just need to return to Konoha". Pain stated. Then, he and all of the other paths started to jump through the trees.
After minutes of jumping through trees, Pain was starting to get annoyed, there was no sign of the Konoha yet? something was wrong. Surely if he was where the other paths were left, he wouldn't be far from Konoha but...
"Hmm? is that a village? but it's not Konoha..." Pain said, eyeing the new environment.
? Village
Pain decided to approach the village to gather information, and he spotted an old man working on a rice field.
The old man was surprised to see 6 people with dark cloaks with red clouds approach him and already was starting to feel intimidated by them, their appearance, and especially their eyes were frightening.
"W-what do you want!? I have nothing of value for you to steal!" the old man stated fearfully.
"I do not wish to steal you anything... but information. Tell me, which way to the leaf village?" Pain asked in a commanding tone.
"Lea... leaf village? what are you talking about...? there's no place with that name around here". The old man replied nervously, confused by what this young man was talking about.
This confirmed Pain's suspicions, either he was very far away from the leaf, or... no, he didn't want to believe this just yet, he would gather more information first.
"Tell me, old man, which way to the nearest major civilization?"
"You just have to follow..." The old man was interrupted by the loud sound of a bell in the village.
"What's this about?" Pain asked, annoyed that they were interrupted.
"Oh no! It's those bandits again!" The old man stated fearfully.
"Bandits?" Pain asked curiously.
"Yes, you should get gotta of here right now, It's a risk for ou people every time they come here. Now if you excuse me, I have to find my wife and my grandchildren! " The old man stated, leaving hurriedly.
Near the entrance of the village, we could see many people gathered.
"The bandits have come, everyone, protect our village! Oh god, please help us!" The village elder started to pray.
"Ha! praying won't help you at all!" stated a fat man dressed in an armor, which was none other than the chief of the bandits; accompanied by his henchman.
Pain frowned. He was just watching everything from the top of some trees. He decided not to interfere just yet, he would wait for the right moment to strike.
"You have already collect taxes this month! We don't have any more to offer! Please, leave us alone!" The elder pleaded, making all the bandits chuckle.
"Hahahahaha! If you don't have the money, you will have to pay us for something else! How about..." the fat man eyed the busty women that were near the elder, giving them a lustful smirk, licking his lips and all the women hugged each other, afraid of this disgusting man. "How about all the women and liquor you have in your village!? the bandit chief demanded and all his men cheered.
"No! please, anything but that!" The elder pleaded.
"Men, what do we do when someone doesn't obey our demands?"
"Kill! Kill!Kill!" all the bandits shouted while pointing their spears to the sky.
"Exactly! Now go, take all their liquor and all their women!" The chief ordered and his henchmen gave a battle cry, but when the bandits were going to attack the villagers, part of them was turned into meat confetti by a missile that exploded, causing smoke to blind the chief's vision.
"W-wha... what was that!?" the chief screamed, surprised at the sudden explosion. All the villagers were paralyzed. It was as if God had answered their prayers.
"I've seen enough." Pain stated simply, the smoke finally clearing, showing an angry Deva path, scaring the bandit's leader.
"Y-you! who are you!? another rebel!? or are you from... the re-re-re-revolutionary army!?" the bandit chief asked gagging while his legs were trembling.
"Oh... It seems that all those claims from before were all just pretense, you are just a coward..." Pain stated while eyeing the fat man, sending him a shiver through the spine.
'Th-these eyes... It was as if they were looking straight into my soul...' the bandit chief thought fearfully.
"Scum like you has no place in this world. Know pain!" The human path grabbed him by the throat and extracted the soul from his body, much to the bandits' fear, and despair, as now they had no leader and had to deal with these monsters.
"Wha-what did you do to our boss!? the bandits asked, all afraid of the 6 figures in front of them.
'I see... so this is what this is all about...' Pain thought while clenching his fist in anger after he received the information extracted from the soul of the chief of the bandits.
The bandits decided to run away but Asura just lifted his arm. "There's no escape" the path stated, firing a missile that created a huge explosion, killing all the bandits.
"T-thank you, God! we are eternally grateful!" the villagers thanked Pain while bowing their heads.
Pain just raised his hand signaling that all that wasn't necessary.
"Get up, I was only clearing the trash". Pain stated.
" I cannot thank you enough for ridding us of those criminals. They work for the minister of the imperial capital and always come here every month to demand abusive taxes! we call them bandits because that's what they truly are. If there is any way I can pay you back, I'm at your disposal, my lord"the village elder stated.
"There is. What is the best road to the imperial capital?"
The village elder explained the best way to reach the imperial capital. He also offered Pain to stay in the village and commemorate with them but he refused and started to leave.
"Wait! can we have your name, please?" the village elder pleaded.
"We are Pain, we are God!" Pain stated, leaving the village.
Road to the Imperial Capital
After running down the road the village elder told him about, Pain saw a boy fighting a creature that according to the information he had, was a Danger beast, an earth dragon to be more precise. In a few strikes, the boy killed the beast and two men who were on a cart congratulated him.
"That was incredible, boy!"
"You took a class one Danger beast by yourself!"
"Oh, it was nothing, kind of like taking candy from a big scaly baby! the name is Tatsumi by the way the whole capital is gonna know my name before too long".
The guards were going to advise the boy but Pain decided that it was time for him to make his presence known.
"So, you're also going to the capital, isn't that right?"
The two men turned around and instantly felt nervous by the intimidating stares of the six figures in front of them.
"Yep, I'm going there to make a name for myself, and who are you guys?"
"Call me Pain. Now, what were you two going to tell this boy? if it is about the capital, I'm also interested to hear about it too".
"Oh, well the capital isn't some perfect dreamland, sure it's the big city but it's overrun with monsters even more vicious than this earth dragon here".
"I don't get it, how can the city be full of danger beasts?"
"Not those monsters, they are humans but with the heart of monsters, the damn place is crawling with them". this statement picked the interest of Pain.
"You mean that they are corrupt" Pain clarified.
"Exactly".
"Thanks for the warning guys, but there's no way I'm turning around and go back now you see me and my friend we have a mission to make a fortune and save our village". Tatsumi said, puffing his chest with pride.
"If you're going to the capital, we will go with you". Pain stated, surprising the boy ' This boy shows promise... maybe I can recruit him to the Akatsuki?' Pain thought.
"Well ok, I don't mind some company".
"Do you know anything about the leaf village? or about shinobi?"
"Leaf village? I never saw a place called that in the maps and shinobi? what is that?" Tatsumi asked with a confused expression.
'So my suspicions were right, somehow I'm not in the elemental nations anymore... I guess going to this capital is the best thing I can do for now'
"Well, we should get going, there's a long way for us to walk". Pain stated, starting to walk down the road.
"Ok!" Tatsumi agreed, anxious to arrive at the capital.
"Why your friends all dress like that? why the piercings? what's up with the eyes? why only you speak?".
"You ask too much". Pain replied simply, frustrating Tatsumi.
The seven were walking towards the capital, where Pain would see that Konoha was far from being the worst he will ever see from humanity.
End of Prologue
Well, this is just the prologue for this story, I had this idea for a long time so I just decided to leave the first chapter ready until I finish with the ideas for the other fic, hope you enjoyed it.
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See you all next chapter :v